Welcome to my stop on this blog tour for ‘The Three Locks’, a Sherlock Holmes adventure, by Bonnie MacBird.
This tour is organised by Random Things Tours. The novel was published on 18th March, 2021, by Collins Crime Club.
A new novel from Katie Fforde is always a treat – so much so that I don’t even need to read the blurb to know that I’ll like it!
Precisely because I hadn’t read the blurb, I was surprised that this book takes place in 1963 as I am used to Fforde’s contemporary romances. What a great setting! From early 1960s London – just about starting to swing – to the promised wedding in the country…this has interesting and engaging settings throughout.
The book is about a young woman, Lizzie, who moves to London to attend a cookery school. Once the course is finished, she cannot bear to think about giving up her new-found freedoms by returning home and so moves into a shabby but fabulous shared house in Belgravia with her new (clearly very wealthy) friends. This leads on to invitations to the country to stay in stately homes…and – before she knows it – her life has been turned upside down and will never be the same again.
Wow, it is hard to write about this book without giving spoilers!
I read Katie Fforde books precisely because nothing bad will happen and everything will work out fine – it is comforting and uplifting, even if it means slightly suspending disbelief at times that things can work out so fortunately. Lucky for Lizzie that one of her cookery course-mates has a huge house in Belgravia – just the first of many fortuitous events!
The characters are appealing and relatable – Lizzie is our fish-out-of-water in the setting of her wealthy friends, David is the gay character whose sexuality is closing doors to him in 1960s London, Meg is a hard-working and talented cook and Alexandra is wealthy but generous in sharing her shabby house with them all. The supporting characters are also generally nice, or at least see the error of their narrow thinking by the end of the novel – this was the 1960s, after all, so we can’t expect modern attitudes to various issues, something that sustains the main plot lines of the book,
The book is a romance and ticks all the boxes that you’d expect – misunderstandings, obstacles and delays abound. However, the love story actually takes a bit of a back seat as Fforde instead focuses on the themes of friendship, social attitudes and even class systems, although – as you’d expect from Fforde – always with a light touch and never preachy.
My only criticism is that the book was a little slow in places and it takes a very long time before the wedding in the country (promised in the title) appears on the horizon. This seems a bit like a spoiler or – at very least – a mis-titling of the book as it is about so much more than a wedding.
Overall, I’d recommend this to fans of Fforde’s contemporary fiction and anyone who needs a reassuring, comfort blanket of a read. It is definitely one to pick up for escapism – maybe something we all need right now.
Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for my copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.
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Header photo with thanks to Jeremy Wong Weddings on Unsplash.
Welcome to my stop on the blog tour for ‘Behind Closed Doors’ by Catherine Alliott.
This book was published on 4th March by Michael Joseph and I thank the publisher for my copy of the book in exchange for an honest review, plus the invitation to join the tour.
I’ve read a lot of Catherine Alliott’s books, although not so recently, so I thought I knew what I was getting myself into with this one. Absolutely not so!
In this book, Lucy Palmer seems to have it all – a big house in London, a job writing cosy crime novels, a handsome husband and two grown-up children who are both successful in their own ways. However, this is all a facade and Lucy’s marriage is about to end spectacularly and suddenly – and, when is does, she has some work to do in dealing with her past. Leaving London, she goes to care for her elderly and bordering-on-alcoholic parents in the country where she starts to rebuild her life.
This is an altogether darker story than I am used to from Alliott, both in the truth about Lucy’s husband, Michael, and the events surrounding the end of the marriage. It also touches on some poignant issues, especially caring for elderly parents and ageing.
However, everything else I expected from Alliott is also there, so this slightly darker turn works well. It still has elements of humour – I really loved Lucy’s parents and their hectic social life of boozy octogenarian parties, plus the sassy teenage twins who have much more of a finger on the pulse than the adults. There’s also romantic strands to the story, although these aren’t as central as I would have expected given what I’ve read of Alliott’s writing previously. Instead, the love story is quite understated and works really well given Lucy’s situation.
I really loved the family dynamic that is at the heart of this book. Lucy is at the centre of a supportive, if slightly eccentric, family network and this is one of the real strengths of the novel. There’s the ageing parents, growing old disgracefully but still frail, Lucy’s sister (Helena) who absolutely has control of everything except her own children, plus Lucy’s children – the strong and reliable Imo and thoughtful, calm Ned. I especially liked the strong women in the novel – Helena and Imo being my favourites, although there are other surprisingly awesome women (and a few men!) along the way.
Although this was not what I wholly expected when I picked up this book, I’d recommend it. It is certainly less cosy than I was anticipating and includes some difficult issues, not least domestic abuse, but it is an immersive and engaging read. I genuinely struggled to put it down and loved the clever, understated explorations of relationships and dependencies between people.
An belated happy publication day to the new poetry collection from Brian Bilston! This little gem of a book was out last Thursday (21st January) so do order now!
I first found Brian Bilston’s poetry on Twitter and loved its clever wordplay – this led me on to his first poetry collection, ‘You Took The Last Bus Home’ and his excellent novel (with poetic interludes) ‘Diary of a Somebody’. I was, therefore, thrilled to be granted an ARC of his new poetry collection by NetGalley and the publisher.
The poetry is – as the title suggests – loosely focused on the theme of love and is exactly what readers have come to expect of Bilston’s poetry – clever wordplay, interesting perspectives, unexpected twists. It is perhaps a little more serious in places than some of his other poetry (and certainly more serious than the ones that are so popular on Twitter). However, it is an enjoyable read – albeit a quick one as it seemed fairly short.
As a Literature geek, I really enjoyed the poems where Bilston riffed on literature from the past, from Shakespeare’s ‘Antony and Cleopatra’ (in ‘Cleopatra’) to Wordsworth (‘Status Update: a Lonely Cloud’) to tragic lovers (‘Five clerihews for Doomed Lovers’). However, Bilston is equally comfortable playing around with Mills and Boon novels, Spoonerisms, Brexit and many other incredibly varied ideas.
This is a lively and varied poetry collection that I’d recommend to those who like their poetry humorous. It does have serious messages and will leave you with food for thought, but – above all else – it is entertaining and engaging.
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Header photo with thanks to Rahul Chakraborty on Unsplash.
